Piccadilly - night world

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Movie
German title Piccadilly - night world
Original title Piccadilly
Country of production Great Britain
original language English
Publishing year 1929
length 108 minutes
Rod
Director Ewald André Dupont
script Arnold Bennett
production British International Pictures , London
music Neil Brand
Harry Gordon (Cinema Music)
camera Werner Brandes
cut JW McConaughty
occupation

Piccadilly - Nachtwelt is a British feature film (silent film) directed by Ewald André Dupont from 1929.

action

The stars of the London nightclub "Piccadilly" are the dancing couple Mabel and Vic, with Vic being the real expert and crowd favorite, while Mabel owes her career primarily to the support of the club owner, Valentine Wilmot, with whom she also has an unofficial love affair. When Mabel and Vic's dance number is disturbed by a guest complaining about a dirty plate, Valentine investigates the cause of the lawsuit and finds all the washing up staff in the kitchen lost in sight of Shosho, a Chinese dishwasher who is instead working Performing improvised dance number. Valentine announces Shosho. A little later, Vic, who is in love with Mabel and hopes to persuade her to go to America with him, to Broadway , quits. Since Vic has repeatedly approached Mabel in the past, the jealous Valentine comes in handy, and when Vic finally claims that Mabel loves him, Valentine takes the opportunity to seal the end of the business relationship with a punch. Since he is still disappointed in Mabel, Valentine secretly takes Shosho, whose termination he is canceling, to his office to let her audition.

After Vic's departure, “Piccadilly” is losing a lot of audience and business is bad. Valentine offers Shosho an engagement behind Mabel's back. Together with the Chinese Jim, with whom Shosho - something Valentine does not know - has a tender love affair, they visit London's Chinatown , Limehouse , to buy a stylish costume for the new dance number. Shosho's Chinese dance number, to which Jim is contributing the music, is received as a sensation by the audience and the press. Mabel is furious with jealousy and eventually faints. Through an indiscretion from the scullery boss Bessie, Mabel learns of Shosho's secret audition in Valentine's office; regardless of this, Jim discovers secrets between Valentine and his girlfriend. Although they still love each other, Mabel resigns her engagement and leaves Valentine, who then gets involved with Shosho. After visiting a dance hall together, Shosho gives Valentine her apartment key. In her room she seduces him with lascivious gestures. Mabel watches everything, waits in front of the house and confronts Shosho after Valentine has left their apartment and Jim has granted her entry. Since she knows that Valentine really means nothing to her rival, she demands that Shosho renounce her lover. However, she proves to be adamant and even uses the opportunity to humiliate Mabel.

The next day, Shosho is found shot dead in her apartment. There is a preliminary investigation in the court, in the course of which Jim first directs the suspicion on his rival Valentine. Surprisingly, Mabel then makes a comprehensive statement: During her visit to Shosho's apartment she had the gun - previously stolen from Valentine - in her handbag; Shosho had finally discovered the pistol there, mistakenly believed he was threatened, and picked up a dagger in self-defense. Mabel doesn't know anything more, however, because she fainted with excitement. At the same time, Jim, who has since left the courtroom, tries to commit suicide with the murder weapon. As he dies, he confesses that he himself shot Shosho - his wife - out of jealousy.

background

The film's nightclub is named after " Piccadilly Circus ", a famous intersection in central London.

Production, theatrical release and restoration

The shooting for "Piccadilly" took place at the British International Pictures Studio, Elstree , Hertfordshire . In the USA the film was first shown on June 1, 1929, in Great Britain probably earlier. Wardour Films Ltd. took over the distribution. (Great Britain) and Sono Art-World Wide Pictures Inc. (USA).

The British Film Institute (BFI) released a restored version of the film in 2003, which it distributes itself in cooperation with Milestone Film & Video and Sunrise Silents .

criticism

Although Gilda Gray is announced as the main actress in the title, the actual main character of the film is the Chinese Shosho, played by Anna May Wong . "Piccadilly" is the first film that Wong made in the UK. She had left the United States in 1928 because, as a Chinese woman in Hollywood, she was locked into roles that would grossly distort the Far East. In Germany and, since 1929, in Great Britain, she found far more opportunities to bring likeable Asian women to the screen.

“Piccadilly” is not free from Chinese stereotypes. The short, cropped, metallic, reflective “Chinese” costume that Shosho wears during her show number can be recognized at first glance as a modern revue prop that has nothing to do with a historical Chinese stage costume. All too obviously she only suffers her death because a woman from the Far East simply cannot get away alive against the background of contemporary film dramaturgy; in the traditional motif repertoire of the western world, the appearance of East Asian women is almost always linked to their death (e.g. " Madama Butterfly "). This connection becomes particularly clear when one compares “Piccadilly” with films in which white women become revuestars: in the 1920s and 1930s their stories almost always lead to happy endings.

On the other hand, however, the Shosho character in no way corresponds to the stereotypical characters that Wong otherwise had to play in Hollywood. She is neither a “ China Doll ”, ie an Asian woman who has to die tragically because her white lover leaves her, nor a “ Dragon Lady ”, ie a Far Eastern vamp who seduces white men in order to betray and deceive them. In this film, Wong shows the entire spectrum from unsophisticated, innocent charm to a certain unscrupulousness, the latter especially in dealing with her lover, Jim, from whom she occasionally lets herself be served as if by a subordinate, but whom she pushes aside. when she just can't use it. While such female characters are usually shown with repulsive features, Wong plays the Shosho with perfect grace, so that the audience is affected rather than indignant by their moral decline.

“Piccadilly” is characterized by a large number of locations, each with a very different social character. The night club “Piccadilly” with its elegant “upper class” audience is contrasted with the lower class milieu of the dishwasher. Further scenes take place in the mysterious and alien world of Chinatown and in a dive bar with an audience of different skin colors. The main character Shosho also crosses the line between the social worlds when she rises from the dishwasher in torn stockings to the fashionably perfectly dressed, elegant stage star.

literature

  • Hodges, Graham Russell Gao: Anna May Wong: From Laundryman's Daughter to Hollywood Legend . New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2004, p. 91ff. ISBN 0312293194 (engl.)

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